Global Supply Chain Product Management Leader Asit Kumar Sahoo On How India Can Become a $5 Trillion Economy

The Covid-19 induced pandemic led to an economic slowdown across the world. For the last couple of months, countries have been trying to resurrect their economic infrastructure. Things have been happening at a slow pace. In such times, individuals, who have a certain amount of expertise in finance and economy, are helping countries get back to normal economic levels and discover spaces that would propel their growth forward. 

One such individual is Asit Kumar Sahoo who has shared his thoughts on how India can become a $5 trillion economy in the near future. Asit has been a global supply chain product management leader and therefore, understands the issues faced by the supply chain industry because of the pandemic. To fix the financial crisis resulting from the Covid-19 situation, Asit believes the supply chain industry needs to be strengthened in different ways.

Elaborating on this, Asit says, “Government and private agencies must work proactively towards resolving the issues plaguing the supply chain industry. The biggest challenge faced by the supply chain industry is managing the high cost involved in auditing new businesses and new clients during the onboarding process. Not just large corporations but small businesses, too, suffer on account of the high audit cost. Since these costs are passed on to direct customers or corporate balance sheets, they affect business margins as well.”

After studying computer science engineering, Asit Kumar Sahoo acquired an MBA degree from Columbia Business School in the United States. Apart from enabling him to have solid technical knowledge, his educational background also sharpened his management skills. After working in several organizations and gaining invaluable experience, Asit also founded a start-up organization that gave him a strong foundation on how to run and manage a business. His education and skills that he acquired with time played an important role in the global supply chain product management leader he is today. 

“In the last few years, India had been at the center of several important events that helped in shaping the economic structure of our contemporary world. India’s business and political leaders have proved to the world that it can smoothly make the transition from being a developing country to emerge as a developed nation. However, there are several challenges that one has to overcome. The pandemic has put the economies of every major country across the world a few years behind but with the right strategy and approach, one would be able to come out of this. In order to reach a $5 trillion economy, India must draw on inspiration from its Fintech revolution to attempt a similar feat in supply chain technology”, he says.

Economic experts and politicians have attributed the breaking of the global supply chain to various factors like Covid-19, the Suez Canal blockage, ransomware attacks, the Russia-Ukraine war and compliance risks such as money laundering, or increased ESG consciousness among consumers and investors. Asit is of the opinion that each of the major issues the country is facing at the moment could be dealt with if they are tackled one by one by different groups of experts.

Sharing his thoughts on this, he says, “The global supply chain is what keeps our economy together. However, it was important to understand that it is also very fragile. It took several events for countries to arrive at this realization. Without certain elements in place, a global supply chain cannot become function properly. We must start by doing a 360-degree assessment of business risks including fraud risk, financial risk, operational risk, regulatory & compliance risk, cyber risk, and geopolitical risk. Before trying to find a solution to a problem, we must take some time to understand where it originates from.”

Asit regularly advises regulatory agencies, private and government organizations and businesses of all sizes on how they can fix some of the most fundamental issues they are dealing with. He is somebody who is known to do a lot of research on every subject that he studies and educates people about. As a global supply chain product management leader, he has added a lot of value to the economies of different countries. Asit currently resides and works in the United States and addresses the most pressing issues confronting both small businesses and large corporations.

Article By: Anuj Sharma